Two new concrete roads – costing thrice the regular estimation – will come up under Tender SURE (Specification for Urban Road Execution) format promising better quality roads that will eliminate the need to dig them for repair of leakage of water.
The roads – Kuloor Ferry Road (Kudroli Temple to New Chitra cinema) and Mangaladevi Temple Road (Srinivasa College Pandeshwara to Ramakrishna Mission) – will have pavements unlike the concrete roads already laid. Streetlights would be on the periphery of the roads rather than in the median, according to MCC Commissioner Harish Kumar K. They would be developed as model roads that could be emulated in future.
Participating in a “meet-the-press” organised by the Dakshina Kannada Working Journalists Association here on Thursday, he said there was a proposal to put a separate track for cyclists but the corporation was opposed to it.
He said providing cycling track only on a small stretch of road would not serve any purpose and this has been taken up with the Government.
He said the works estimated to cost about Rs. 17 crore – Rs. 11.5 crore for the road near Kudroli Temple and Rs. 4.5 crore for the one near Mangaladevi Temple – will begin in a month-and-a-half.
Tender SURE is a document, based on a recommendation by a Bangalore-based engineer, that enables a city planner or a contractor to refer to Tender SURE documents as a single-point reference for design, procurement and execution of urban roads instead of referring to many documents.
The corporation Commissioner said a newly posted Superintending Engineer had proposed outsourcing maintenance of roads so that a team was available to attend to repair of small patches of road at any given point of time.
He said the new vented dam coming up near Thumbe could be ready by December 2013.
It would hold a quantity of water that would be sufficient for 90 days after the inflows have stopped. The present dam could hold water that could be supplied for 45 days only.
He said 33 cases of illegal constructions against which the Minister for Urban Development S. Sureshkumar wanted action taken were pending in the district court. “Those who have invested will fight (to retain the buildings),” Mr. Harish Kumar said.
He agreed that the construction debris was being dumped at a few places without any control but said nobody was willing to lodge a complaint. When a journalist pointed out that he had given complaints with photographic proof but action had not been taken, he promised to initiate action in this regard.
